Wellington, New Zealand

We didn’t have much planned today, just a couple sites to see plus the City Gallery Wellington, a contemporary arts gallery.

Most stores were open today so we did some browsing. Heather got a bunch of merino wool tops (replacing the one she lost in Savu Savu when she handed in her laundry, which seems like ages ago).

The first site on the list was the Beehive, which is the local nickname for the beehive-shaped government buildings. It’s beside the parliament buildings; the whole area is nicely landscaped and worth the walk over.

Nearby is Old St Paul’s, a gothic revival cathedral built in 1860. It’s a beautiful church to see. It’s a little out of the CBD so doesn’t see as many tourists but if you’re in Wellington you should go see it.

Had lunch at a random Turkish place, it was okay. The owner was super-friendly though.

Last for today was City Gallery Wellington. It had some cool exhibitions, including a feature by Joanna Margaret Paul that we really liked. By coincidence we had seen an exhibit by her husband, Jeffrey Harris, in Christchurch. Both the exhibits had a segment reflecting on the death of their 2nd daughter, which is how we made the connection.

We were hoping to grab a coffee at gallery but their cafe was closed over the holidays.

We were close to the waterfront and could hear the sound checks for the NYE celebration.

We had dinner reservations at Highwater Eatery, one of the few places I found that was a) open b) took reservations and c) didn’t have a big NYE dinner / buffet. Cause it was NYE it felt more like summerlicious with the kitchen just constantly pushing out the same food. It was probably the best we could expect on NYE.

We got back to our apartment around 10pm and were asleep well before midnight. The new year would have to wait until we woke up.

Wellington, New Zealand

Wellington has a walking tour of outdoor sculptures so we figured we’d start with that, it’s a good way to orient ourselves in a new city.

We started mid-way through the suggested tour cause it was beside our bnb. The tour then wound its way to the waterfront, past Te Papa (the National Museum). The pics of the waterfront redevelopment reminded us of Toronto. They’ve done a great job here creating public spaces.

The sculpture tour continued along the waterfront to the train station, at which point the tour cut into the city core and back towards our starting point. Wellington has compact core, very lively and creative. We liked it.

We had lunch at Dragons, a Chinese restaurant a couple doors down from our bnb. Heather had noticed it yesterday, it looked busy enough. Turns out it was super packed and we were lucky to get seated without a reservation! We had dim sum for the first time since covid, it was excellent.

After lunch we relaxed for a bit at the bnb and then went to visit Te Papa. It’s free admission so we gave a donation (which you can do with tap here).

The lower floor was very busy so unlike Drake we started at the top. They had some really interesting exhibits by Māori artists. It took us a couple hours to get through the 5th and 4th floors; we quickly walked through the rest.

We didn’t have dinner reservations for this evening. I had booked something in October but they had since emailed to say they were closed over Christmas due to lack of staff. So we wandered down Cuba St which has a high density of restaurants. Ended up at Floriditas where we had a really nice bottle of Grüner Veltliner which the sommelier was happy that we tried. The food was okay.

Wellington, New Zealand

We said goodbye to the South Island today, taking the Interislander ferry across the Cook Strait to Wellington.

We had breakfast at Sime’s cafe on the way out of Kaikōura. We had just missed the end of breakfast yesterday and so I was able to have their eggs benedict today which was excellent. The food came out quickly and we were back on the road a little after 10am.

It’s about a two hour drive from Kaikōura to Picton. The drive is beautiful, as all drives here seem to be. We were back in wine region, this time Marlborough.

We arrived at the ferry around noon and checked in. I had bought our tickets as soon as their summer schedule was released back in May. In the local media there’s warnings about how busy the crossing is right now and to book ahead, so lucky we knew our itinerary so far in advance.

We waited in line until 1pm when they started boarding. We parked our car and grabbed some good seats for the 3.5 hour crossing.

There’s the option to book car rentals where you drop off the car in Picton and then get a different car on the Wellington side. But that meant dragging all our luggage across as carry on, and also chancing that there may not be a vehicle waiting on the other side. So we booked a single car for the full trip and paid for its ferry crossing.

The ferry departed right on schedule. The first part was interesting, through the Queen Charlotte Sound / Tōtaranui. It looked similar to sounds we saw in Fjiordland except the hills are much lower and flatter. But still very scenic.

The waves increased slightly when we left the protection of the sounds and entered Cook Strait. The swells were about 1m which is considered good. There’s websites that forecast the swells and so we knew in advance what to expect. We only really noticed it when we got up and walked around.

It took a while to disembark in Wellington. We docked around 5:30pm and we didn’t drive on to shore for another 45 minutes. It gave me time to memorize the route to our bnb in the centre of town.

We had got used to remote areas and parking anywhere to unload the car. It’s a whole other story in a busy city. We parked in a loading zone and hoped we wouldn’t get a ticket. There’s a few very popular restaurants on our street so all the meter parking was occupied.

I then drove the car to a carport about five minutes away, while Heather finished getting everything up the stairs and into our apartment.

We had reservations at 8pm so rushed to get ready. I then looked up a similarly sounding restaurant in Google Maps and we walked 8 minutes in the wrong direction. So I called the real restaurant and let them know we were running late so they’d hold the table.

We ate at Atlas, which was one of the better restaurants we’ve eaten at, probably only Restaurant Ö was better. Their website said they had a 3 or 4 course tasting; when we were seated it turned out it was actually a six course tasting. It was all excellent, with no misses. The wine pairings were good too. It hardly seemed like we started the day on the South Island.

Kaikōura, New Zealand

We didn’t sleep well at all, partly because we were worried about sleeping in through our 5am alarm. This morning was our big albatross tour!

We drove down to Encounter Kaikōura at 5:30am to check in for the tour. We were a few minutes early and looking for caffeine. The excursion folks suggested we try the Sudima hotel next door. It turned out their kitchen didn’t open till 6am, but the very nice person there made us a couple cappuccinos for takeaway, on the house.

Our guide / boat driver, Gary, met us at 5:45am. There were nine of us on the excursion (Encounter does small groups, one of the reasons I had booked with them). We drove five minutes to the jetty on the other side of the peninsula. We then got on the boat while it was dry docked, the first time I’ve had to do that. (I think the 2016 earthquake messed up the water depths at the jetty).

The water looked calm, but in a smaller boat even swells of 1m were making me and Heather feel a bit naseous. We went out about 3km to where the shelf drops off, which creates a natural feeding area for the albatross.

A few giant petrels followed us. They have a wingspan of 2m and looked pretty big. They are also a very mean bird, with a call that sounds prehistoric. Gary said you wouldn’t want to get in a fight with it. He probably didn’t need to give us the warning, lol, I wasn’t going anywhere near it.

We got to the shelf drop off and cut the engines. A few Royal Great Albatross landed about 100m in the distance; Gary said they are shy at first but would eventually paddle their way towards us. These were enormous, with wingspans over 3m! They made the giant petrels look small. We also saw two Wandering Albatrosses, with a wingspan of 3.7m, the largest flying bird in the world!

Over the next hour we saw 18 albatrosses, 16 petrels, 60+ shearwaters and a bunch of other birds. Gary kept track of the sightings for research purposes; and then gave us a copy back on shore.

Both of us were feeling seasick most of the time, we enjoyed seeing the birds but not as much as we might have. I also found looking through my camera lens threw me off. So didn’t get as many pics as I might have. Oh well.

We boated over to another location closer to shore, where we saw dolphins pods swimming about. And then we saw a random little blue penguin! It quickly disappeared in the waves.

The excursion was really well run, with respect for the wildlife. There was no chasing after birds or other sea life. Gary was also really knowledgeable.

We got back to shore and drove back to the Encounters facility. It was crowded with tourists getting ready for the later morning tours. The company also runs dolphin tours, including one where you can snorkel with them. That sounds way too cold for me, I much prefer Fiji waters.

We decided to have breakfast at their cafe. While waiting for our food, we overheard a lot of tourists come in to try to book same-day excursions, only to be turned away cause they were fully booked. Good thing we had booked ahead!

We decided to do the Kaikoura Peninsula Walkway as soon as we got back to our bnb. We thought if we sat down we’d fall asleep and then lose momentum for the day. The weather had turned, it was now misty / cloudy and half drizzling. One thing I really like about smartphones is that they’re water resistant, whereas my camera stayed in my backpack to start.

There was a shortcut marked on the trail that allowed us to skip the in-town part of the walk. We had some difficulty picking out the trail markings for the shortcut at the corner of Cromer and Ward St but figured it out. It started with steps over a fence and through a sheep paddock. We had to watch our steps here! About halfway down to the shore we picked up another road, and it was a clearly marked trail the rest of the way.

We walked along Fyffe Quay to the parking lot at Point Kean. This is a popular tourist lookout for seals and was a bit crowded. The walkway went back up the cliffs to the Point Kean Lookout and then wound its way along the top of the cliff to a lookout over Whalers Bay. There were dozens of seals lounging about. They aren’t much for pics as a seal lounging about looks the same as a dead seal. The weather had cleared so I had my camera out again.

We continued along the walkway to the South Bay lookout, and then down to the jetty where we had launched for the albatross tour earlier this morning. It was about noon and starting to warm up. We had started the walk in 13C and drizzly and had slowly ditched layers throughout the morning.

Took another shortcut, this one more structured, called Tom’s Path, which brought us back to Scarborough St and back to our bnb. The full circuit took us just over three hours, although we did stop for a lot for pics.

Threw some water on our faces and then went out for lunch. We wanted to try Emporium Brewery along Hwy 1 but it was closed over the holidays. Instead tried out Sime’s Kitchen a few doors down. It was excellent! (Later I realized that our bnb host had recommended it too).

We crashed for a couple hours and when we woke up the weather had cleared and we had a beautiful view of the bay.

For dinner we had reservations at The Pier, one of the classic restaurants for crayfish. The region is known for crayfish, in fact Kaikōura means ‘eat crayfish’ in Māori. So we drove down and ordered crayfish :) it was pretty good, grilled in the half shell and served with garlic butter.

On the way back home we drove up to Kaikōura Lookout to watch the sunset. It’s a two minute walk from our place but it was super windy. You can see both sides of the peninsula from the lookout. Watched the sun go down and then drove home. It was a very full day.

Kaikōura, New Zealand

It was drizzling and miserable as we packed up the car to leave Christchurch for Kaikōura. The weather cleared up as we headed north. We were now into NZ holiday season and there was much more traffic, with locals heading out of town, ‘caravanning’ as they call it. Mostly we were just in trains of cars, it was quite the change from earlier in the trip when we’d be the only car on the road.

We drove the 2.5 hours straight to Kaikōura. The last 30 minutes was spectacular, with seals lounging on the rocky coast and tunnels through the mountains which dropped right into the ocean.

Kaikōura sits on a peninsula jutting into the Southern Ocean. Our bnb was atop a ridge overlooking the town and the bay. It was a bit strange to enter the bnb. The host was vacationing on the west coast, and had left instructions on how to find the key to enter. All our previous bnb’s had lockbox codes or keycode entry. We weren’t sure we had the right house until we found the key hidden in a box of soap as instructed.

We drove back into town (if there were stairs down the cliff it would have been a five minute walk, instead it was an eight minute drive). It was a bit of a shock to see how busy it was in the main street, March Break-like.

Luckily we found a parking spot on the street, and then walked up and down the street deciding on a cafe for lunch. Had a bagel with smoked salmon at Chiwis, which was highly rated on Google Maps but maybe was overwhelmed by the crowds today. At least their coffee was good.

We had dinner reservations at Zephyr at 7pm so decided to do the Peninsula Walkway track tomorrow, as it’s a three hour walk and we didn’t want to be rushed. We had hoped to instead see the museum this afternoon. When we walked around earlier the sign had said it was closed until January, but then we saw someone walk in! So not sure what the sign was about, but the museum was definitely open.

We paid for two adults and toured around the museum. It wasn’t too bad. They had an exhibit about the 2016 earthquake that devastated the area, knocking them off-grid and inaccessible by land for weeks.

Got back home and cleaned up for dinner. I had made reservations at Zephyr back in September, which seemed a bit silly at the time, but we were glad we had it now that we’re in peak tourist season.

Christchurch, New Zealand

We had time yesterday to read up on all the attractions in Christchurch and pick the ones we wanted to see given we just had one day to see them. Oddly, the Lonely Planet recommended the Art Gallery and not the Museum, and the Moon Guide was the opposite. Based on other sources, the Art Gallery was the top site to see, so that’s where we started.

The Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū has free admission, we left the suggested donation. It’s spread across six exhibits on two floors. We started with the upstairs. The gallery wasn’t busy at all, which surprised me.

We were really impressed with the exhibits. We spent over two hours just on the upstairs galleries. By then we were out-galleried and so left for lunch. It’s really a place that requires multiple visits.

We had lunch at Banh Mi EM, which was excellent, it really hit the spot. The part of town it’s in looked to be more where locals went out, as opposed to bars and restaurants on Oxford Terrace along the Avon River which looked more touristy.

Next on our itinerary was Christchurch Transitional Cathedral, commonly known as the Cardboard Cathedral. It’s the temporary cathedral while the original is being restored. There’s all sorts of rules about deconsecrating churches that had to be followed. The temporary cathedral was built in 11 months, partially out of cardboard tubes. It’s designed by Japanese architect Shigeru Ban (he also designed a temporary church in Kobe). Anyways it was interesting to see.

The final site we wanted to see was 185 White Chairs, a temporary exhibit commemorating the people who died in the 2011 earthquake. It was very well done.

Throughout the day we had crisscrossed the core a few times. There was much more open today, including most stores.

Before heading home we stopped in at Riverside Market, it’s filled with local food retailers, sort of like St Lawrence Market in Toronto. Had a 4-beer paddle at the Canterbury Brewers Collective kiosk, a great way to sample the local craft beers.

Walked back home and had dinner, wrapping up our tour of Christchurch.

Christchurch, New Zealand

Merry Christmas! We slept in and had a relaxing breakfast in our little Airbnb. It was a beautiful day, 22C and sunny, and low humidity.

We picked up our dinner from Pedro’s House of Lamb just before 11am (it was less than a 10 minute walk). It smelled amazing, I think it’s more usual here to have a big brunch / lunch, and so the lamb was ready to eat. We weren't planning to eat for a few hours, so we put in the fridge for later this evening. Pedro's provided handy reheating instructions with the takeout.

The only thing open in Christchurch today was the Botanic Gardens (I had to look up, both botanical and botanic are grammatically correct, botanic has fallen out of common usage). I think most of the tourists in town (and some locals too) also made a visit here today, some bringing food for a picnic. It’s a really nice park in the heart of the city. For some families it looked like a Christmas Day tradition to have a bbq picnic in the park.

Walked around a bit more, checking out the open hours of various places for tomorrow that we wanted to visit, like the Art Gallery and the Museum.

There wasn’t much open at all, just two food trucks and one coffee shop. But just walking around the city core was pretty good, one of the more interesting cities we’ve visited over Christmas.

Got back to our place and relaxed. Listened to Ludacrismas, somewhat of a Christmas tradition for us.

The reheating instructions from Pedro’s suggested it would take only 15 minutes to reheat the lamb and potatoes, but I think that’s if it was left on the counter. We were reheating from the fridge and it took over an hour.

And so we had our little Christmas dinner. The lamb was excellent, we had also splurged for a nicer bottle of Pinot noir. The sides were great too - coleslaw, sliced potatoes and fresh peas, which I steamed. Mmm good.

Christchurch, New Zealand

Christmas Eve! We had a pretty good breakfast at The Vicarage, our bnb in Oamaru. It was just down the street from Countdown (a supermarket), we walked down to get groceries for the next couple days, as we weren’t sure what would be open over Christmas and Boxing Day.

We’re in the heart of Otago, a major fruit growing region, and so stopped at roadside pick-your-own raspberry farm about 20 minutes outside Oamaru. They also sold pre-picked fruit which we got.

There was a constant stream of traffic heading out of Christchurch. Our bnb was off Montreal St, one of the major streets in Christchurch, so it was easy to drive to, the opposite of our Dunedin experience.

Our bnb in Christchurch is a full unit in a row of townhouses. It came with its own garage too! The area was residential but minutes away from the main pedestrian areas. No chimney though for Santa.

Later in the afternoon we walked into town. Over 80% of the buildings in the CBD were destroyed by the earthquakes in 2010 & 2011, including the main cathedral and other historical buildings. The restoration is planned over many years. Right now it reminds me of the waterfront development in Toronto - lots of urban planning in the design, just waiting for things to be completed so people can move in and bring life to everything.

There were a handful of restaurants open today on Christmas Eve, although we planned to cook at home. The weather was perfect, about 22C.

We also walked down to Pedro’s House of Lamb, a Christchurch institution. They have a Christmas Day special of slow-cooked lamb shoulder and sides. I had ordered back in October as they only take 80 orders and as you can imagine it sells out quickly. Today we just wanted to check out where it was. It was also conveniently located beside a Liquorland which had a ginormous selection of local wines and craft beer.

We got back to our place and cleaned up. We had salmon again for dinner, getting our fix of King Salmon while we’re in NZ, along with a local white.

Oamaru, New Zealand

We had one of the shorter drives of our trip today, just 90 minutes to Oamaru. Had another uninspiring breakfast at Fable Dunedin, finished packing up, got our car from the valet and then departed.

I got caught up in the turn-only lanes again, so looped around for one last view of the hotel before getting in the correct lane to get out of the city core.

About an hour north of Dunedin we reached Moeraki, home of the Instagram-famous Moeraki boulders. These are spherical boulders about 3’ in diameter that dot the shore. It’s a popular tourist stop off. We arrived around 11:30am, at low tide. During low tide the boulders are on the beach, more accessible and harder to get tourist-free pics. The tourists came in bunches and I did get my tourist-free pics after a few minutes though.

We then went into Moeraki Village for lunch. The classic, Fleurs Place, unfortunately closed permanently recently for non-covid reasons. Fleurs has been written up in international travel publications and even has its own Wikipedia entry. Our Airbnb hosts in Oamaru suggested we instead try The Fishwife, supposedly the best fish and chips in NZ.

We showed up at The Fishwife, but due to lack of staffing over Christmas just had crawfish on menu (no accoutrements like fries, just crawfish). So we went across the street to Moeraki Tavern, which I remembered reading was just as good as The Fishwife.

We both had fish and chips, it was excellent. I wonder how much better Fleurs or The Fishwife could have been, cause this was pretty darned good.

It was only another 30 minutes to Oamaru and our Airbnb. It’s in a historical building, a former vicarage.

We were a bit early to checkin so had emailed with the host, and dropped off the car and then explored Oamaru. One of the draws is the Steampunk HQ, a museum, but that wasn’t our thing. Instead we wandered around the neighbouring Victorian Precinct and the wharf. It was very photogenic.

Got back to the bnb and met our host, Jacqui. She was very enthusiastic, happy that we had been out touristing in her town. (On the way back we also stopped in at the local Countdown, a grocery store, to stock up pre-Christmas for Christchurch).

We relaxed for a bit and then headed back out for our Little Blue Penguin excursion! The penguins come ashore at dusk (after 9:30pm this time of year). There’s a viewing gallery set up on shore, I had bought tickets before we left Toronto. There’s also a convenient restaurant next door, where we had reservations for 7pm.

Dinner was average, but it was more about the location. Went over to the Penguin conservatory around 8:30pm. Seating is first-come-first-served, we were in the 2nd row, an excellent viewpoint.

At 9pm the Penguin folks started their little spiel on the penguins. At 9:30 the first raft of seven penguins came onshore. They were really cute, about 18” tall, waddling towards their nests for the night, passing by about 10’ in front of us.

It took another 30 minutes to see the next raft, and then they started coming in constantly. Over the course of the evening we saw about 150 penguins. It’s one of the highlights of the South Island in my opinion. You can watch a live webcam of the penguins coming ashore, just remember it's +13 UTC.

We were lucky with the weather, it was about 15C at 11pm when we left. We wore multiple layers to stay warm (it gets cold just sitting around). Our host also gave us blanket to wrap around our legs.

They don’t allow pics cause flashes scare the penguins from coming onshore. You don’t need to use a flash, but there’s always someone in the group who doesn’t realize their flash is on, so it’s easier just to have a blanket ban on pics. So unfortunately I don’t have any pics, but I did get to watch them the whole time and not get caught up in picture taking.

On the drive out we passed by a handful of penguins waddling along. We drove at 20km to make sure we didn’t hit any. (The penguin folks also asked that we check under the car before departing to make sure there weren’t any penguins underneath).

It made for a very full day, which in fact was a transit day.

Dunedin, New Zealand

Breakfast was disappointing at our hotel, Fable Dunedin. I think I had booked here cause it’s a historic building, and it does have lots of character. But breakfast is not its thing.

Anyways I had planned on the itinerary to take a day trip to Port Chalmers, for boutique stores and galleries and the like, but based on our whirlwind tour of Dunedin yesterday, figured we could do the same thing here in Dunedin without the hassle of driving.

There’s lots of street art in Dunedin so sketched out a rough path. Started at the train station, which is a beautiful building and one of the most photographed buildings in NZ. Unfortunately it’s undergoing restoration right now :( instead just checked out the art galleries upstairs at the station.

It was close to lunch so walked over to Beam Me Up Bagels, based on online recommendations. I had the cold smoked salmon bagel and Heather had the hot smoked version. Both were excellent.

Then we started the street art tour in earnest. The tourism board had a booklet on a Dunedin with a page for the street art. We followed their map to see most of the art, plus a few more not noted. It’s a great way to explore a city, we walked through areas we otherwise may have overlooked. (Penang in Malaysia was one of the trendsetters for this).

It took us a while to see most of the street art; the city is compact but it’s still very car-centric, so we spent a lot of time waiting at streetlights. At least here it’s acceptable to jaywalk, unlike Hobart.

We had a double espresso at Precinct Foods, their dessert was amazing.

Went back to the hotel to rest up for a few minutes before heading back out to see Toitū Otago Settlers Museum. I think it would be better marketed as a history museum, but what do I know. It was about 3pm (the place closed at 5pm) so we figured the main rush of people would have left already.

Anyways we really enjoyed the museum. There wasn’t anything specific that stood out; it was mostly a bunch of historical stuff that explained what / why we’d been seeing in NZ. Like that Abel Tasman was a Dutch explorer (we’ve seen many things named Abel Tasman) or the history behind various cultures arriving in NZ.

The last exhibit focused on communications and technology, and had a iPad (!) as one of the museum pieces.

Got back home with just enough time to shower and head back out for dinner. Tonight we ate at Plato, a restaurant all about fresh seafood. It made a nice contrast to the trendy place yesterday. It’s right on the wharf and the seafood was excellent. We split a bunch of dishes to sample almost all the types of seafood, including oysters, ceviche (more like kokoda), clams and mussels in a white wine broth, and one of the catches of the day, coconut with blue moki.

The sun was just setting as we left, (it’s the solstice today) and the lighting on the harbour was amazing.

Took a circuitous route home. We happened to pass by the Indigo Room, a little bar near one of the street art we’d see earlier, and recommended by a passerby. So we stopped in for a drink, it was a really cool place, even though we were probably two hours early and a couple decades late.

Dunedin, New Zealand

We had breakfast at our lodge overlooking Tahakopa Bay, one of the last times this trip we’ll have such a great view of the ocean. Both of us though were looking forward to Dunedin, and being in an urban setting again for a couple days.

It’s under two hours to Dunedin, so we added in a detour to Nugget Point Lighthouse. We drove along a gravel road for the first 20 minutes from the lodge to get back to the Southern Scenic Route, and then quickly reached then turn off for Nugget Point. The last five km approaching the point is along The Nuggets Rd, which hugs the coastline, dotted with picturesque homes. It also narrowed to a single lane around tight bends - we were lucky to not encounter any caravans (camper vans) or minibuses going the other way.

We reached the parking lot, about 75% full. Not sure what happens in busy season, there’s not much room for overflow. Anyways, it was cold and windy so we put on all our winter gear for the ten minute walk to the lighthouse.

It’s a beautiful walk along the ridge, about 200m above the sea. We saw a couple canteens of royal spoonbills (amazingly, there is a collective noun for spoonbills) on the rocks below.

You get the classic view of the lighthouse along the path, with the ridge in the foreground and the large rocks (the ‘nuggets’) in ocean below. Spent a few minutes at the base of the lighthouse and then walked back to the car.

We had booked a tasting menu for dinner tonight so just wanted something small for lunch, and not too late in the afternoon. Stopped in Balclutha, a small town along the way. The town has a nice span bridge across the Clutha River. There wasn’t much in terms of cafe options - we ended up at Cafe 55 and split a club sandwich. It was served open-faced and messy to eat, but it was tasty.

Then we carried onto Dunedin. It reminded us of Hobart with the hilly streets and turn of the century architecture. It was a bit confusing to drive in, as some lanes suddenly become turn-only lanes. A couple u-turns later we arrived at the rear of our hotel, Fable Dunedin. Walked around to the front to figure out parking and checkin. Drove the car to the front to unload, and then the valet guy drove our car away, hopefully somewhere safe.

Our room was very small, with barely enough room to open our suitcases. Oh well, it was just for a couple days.

We walked into the Octagon, the centre of town. It’s bustling with pubs and churches and cinemas. It was drizzling a little so walked back to the hotel.

We had dinner at Moiety, in a beautiful old building. Our table wasn’t yet ready so we had a drink at the bar. It’s a 5-course tasting here. We also had some oysters from Marlborough to start, which were similar to the ones we had on Bruny Island. We liked all the courses. It took a while to get through dinner, almost three hours. We got home quite full.

Purakauiti, New Zealand

We didn’t do much today. We had originally planned to see Cathedral Caves, about 30 minutes south of us, but it hadn’t yet opened for the season (later we found it’s cause they are updating the tourist infrastructure). It looked to be a dreary day so we just hung out at our lodge, it was a nice place to watch the ocean. We’d also been on the go for the past few days so a day of no driving or bug repellent sounded good. Took pictures of the sheep in the adjacent fields. Went for a short walk up the dirt road when the sun poked its head out. Caught up in our laundry.

For dinner we had the salmon from Southern Seafood Products, it was excellent.

Purakauiti, New Zealand

It didn’t take us long to pack up the car for our drive to Purakauiti, on Tahakopa Bay in the Catlins. The fastest route takes three hours but we opted to take the Southern Scenic Drive, which is four hours driving plus stops.

First we drove into town to do some grocery shopping. The best produce was at Four Square, and they had a better bakery too. We already had wine from Clyde Village Winery, where we had gone on a tour a few days ago. Then it was on the road!

We stopped for a quick break after an hour to see the Clifden Suspension Bridge, which was just a couple minutes off the highway. It was an interesting enough stop.

Just south of Tuatapere we reached the ocean again, (technically the Foveaux Strait). The views were gorgeous. We had another quick stop at Gemstone Beach, which as its name suggests, is covered with polished stones various colours of gemstones. We spent a few minutes collecting some interesting looking ones.

We planned to call in at Southern Seafood Products in Invercargill for fresh king salmon. The folks at Clyde Village Winery had recommended it as the best place in town for fresh seafood. It was easy to get to from the highway. They are mostly a wholesaler but also have a small storefront where they sell to consumers. There was a constant flow of regulars coming in for their favourites while we were there. We picked up some salmon fillets for dinner.

It was around 12:30pm and a good time for lunch. There were some highly rated cafes nearby, so we went to the closest, The Pig Station. It turned out to be in the old train station, and had tons of character. And also excellent coffee. We split a bacon buttie, basically bacon on toast with some mayo and tomatoes. It was really tasty.

Invercargill had a really good vibe to it. It doesn’t have the big tourist draws that the rest of Fjiordland has, but we both thought we would have enjoyed a couple days here.

We got back on the Southern Scenic Route, next stop, our Airbnb. The turn off was a few minutes east of Papatowai, and then about 20 minutes on a gravel road to finally get to the Tahakopa Bay Retreat.

Our place was off the grid, with no cell reception. It’s solar powered and had wifi (I’m assuming via Starlink). It overlooked Tahakopa Bay, we could see the full bay and the waves slowly crashing in. We were a bit elevated so it wasn’t as loud as other places we’ve stayed at recently, but it had one of the best views.

There’s a path down to the beach so we changed into warmer clothes (it was only about 12C) and trekked down. The path was muddy from the recent rains, but still navigable. It took us about 20 minutes to descend to the beach.

The tide was just starting to go out, so the sand was really firm. First walked five minutes to the cliffs to the south, and then walked about 30 minutes down the beach in the other direction. We turned around to head back home at that point. (Later from the lodge it looked like we almost reached Papatowai, about half way down the beach). We were lucky with our timing just after the tide turned, as there were no sandflies at all, until just before we exited the beach.

It was nice to be able to make our own dinner after eating in restaurants the past few days. We had lamb with grilled vegetables and an excellent pinot noir. The wood pellet burner had heated the whole place up, it was a nice evening.

Te Anau, New Zealand - Glowworm Caves

We had a 3rd excursion from Te Anau today, this one a half day to see the glowworm caves. Glowworms are found mostly in NZ and parts of Australia. The worms use a blue glow to attract their prey that then get caught in sticky strands. The glowworms are most impressive seen in caves cause of the surrounding darkness.

The visit to Te Anau Glowworm Caves was easy to get to - the departure is right in town. Real NZ organizes the excursion including a 45 minute boat ride across Lake Te Anau to the caves. (Real NZ are the same people that organized our excursion to Doubtful Sound yesterday).

We boarded the boat at 10:15am. There were lots of kids for this excursion, it’s a pretty cool trip for kids (of all ages!). We recognized some tourists from yesterday, it’s common to do multiple excursions here.

The Real NZ folks gave a commentary on the boat ride, parts of it were getting repetitive for us. They’re all very good speakers.

At the caves, we were split into groups of about twelve for the cave tour itself. We entered the cave, walking along a metal boardwalk. The cave is very young (relatively), only about 12,000 years, and so the stalagmites are only a few cm long. There was water dripping down in places, and it’s about 12C in the caves. We wore our rain jackets and base layers.

The lighting gets progressively dimmer as we got further into the cave. It’s designed to allow our eyes to slowly adjust to the dark, to maximize the glowworm experience.

We boarded a small boat with a bench down the middle, six on each side facing outwards. Our guide then turned off the remaining lights and we proceeded in the darkness.

It’s almost like a Disney ride, the way the boat bumped along the sides as we moved forward slowly. Then we saw the glowworms! They’re in bunches, looking like stars or LED Christmas tree lights, except it’s natural. It was really cool. The highlight is a 4’x8’ grouping that seemed like it was only a couple feet above our head, like I could reach out and touch them. The guide manoeuvred the boat so everyone had a good view.

We returned back in the dark to the starting point, where the next group of twelve were waiting. We swapped places and then retraced our steps down the boardwalk to exit the caves.

The actual viewing was only about 10 minutes, but it was more than enough. It makes sense to do it by boat, so that people aren’t stumbling around in the dark, and they keep moving. Cameras aren’t allowed in the caves, although even if they were, there’s nothing that is photographable. Overall it was a really cool excursion, something neither of us had seen before.

We returned by boat to Te Anau, and went for lunch. Heather had noticed a little cafe previously that looked interesting. Split a pizza and Greek salad, both were tasty.

The rest of the day we relaxed back at our bnb, going through our pics from the past few days and updating our blog.

Had dinner at The Fat Duck again, it was good. Tomorrow we were back on the road, so had an early night.

Te Anau, New Zealand - Doubtful Sound

Two of the most popular excursions in Fjiordland are the day trips to Milford Sound and Doubtful Sound. Both are named ‘sounds’ but are actually fjiords. Milford Sound is the most popular; Doubtful Sound is larger and more inaccessible. Fortunately we had the time to visit both this trip and didn’t have to choose. Yesterday we went to Milford Sound, and today was our excursion to Doubtful Sound.

The starting point is at Pearl Harbour in Manapouri, a 20 minute drive from Te Anau. We left our bnb around 9:15am to allow extra time to find parking etc, although that’s not really an issue here.

Got our passes and boarded the boat at 10am. From Manapouri it’s a 45 minute boat ride across Lake Manapouri to West Arm. We had seats up top, more to be outside. The view was okay, similar to any lake with little islands. There were about 120 tourists on the excursion.

Then we switched to three buses for the 45 minute drive across Wilmot’s Pass to Deep Cove. At the pass, the buses stopped so everyone could get pics of Doubtful Sound. It was a steep downhill from there to Deep Cove (pop. 2). In Deep Cove we boarded a catamaran for the tour of Doubtful Sound. We grabbed a couple bench seats on the top deck.

Doubtful Sound was named when Captain Cook, exploring in 1770, thought it would be doubtful if he could make it back out to the Tasman Sea if he entered the sound, based on the prevailing winds.

It was mostly cloudy as we pulled away. It then got windy, and finally a bit rainy. This drove most of the other folks to the lower decks. The weather then cleared up, with the sun poking out, but the other folks remained on the lower decks, leaving just a handful of us up top.

As the sun came through and the clouds lifted, the mountains came into view. It was really cool to go down the sound. It’s generally a bit wider and not and tall as Milford, but it does have some really narrow sections. It also has a few arms that we explored down (First Arm and Crooked Arm).

The coolest part was approaching the Tasman Sea past Shelter Islands. It looks like you’re dropping off the end of the earth, like some sort of flat earth rendering. I’m not sure what causes this illusion, maybe it’s the freshwater meeting the sea. It wasn’t until we were about 500m away that you could finally see the Tasman Sea. The water got rougher so we reversed and went back up the sound.

Overall I’d say Milford Sound was a more impressive sight; and Doubtful Sound a cooler experience. In First Arm the captain turned off the engines so we could experience the ‘sound of silence’ (I'm pretty sure the pun was intended). It was still a bit windy so I wouldn’t call it silence, but it was still pretty cool.

Then we retraced our journey back home, 45 minutes by bus and 45 minutes by boat. We slept through most of it. We still had to drive 20 minutes to get back to the bnb. (Some people then board a bus for a 2.5 hour drive back to Queenstown!)

It was another full day excursion, and again well worth it.

Had dinner at Ristorante Paradiso, which was okay Italian food. They did make the best espresso we’ve had this trip though.

Te Anau, New Zealand - Milford Sound

Today was our big excursion to Milford Sound / Piopiotahi. We were up and at breakfast at 7am, so that we’d be ready for our pickup from the bnb at 8am.

Chatted at breakfast with another couple staying at the bnb. They were also going to Milford Sound, but with a different operator. We had booked ours through the bnb. Sarah (our host) knows just about everyone in town so we figured she knew the best tour, and also could help in case of any issues.

Trips & Tramps picked us up a little after 8am. We were the last pickup on the way out of town so that worked well for us, avoiding the milk run.

The driver was really friendly and had excellent commentary along the two hour drive along the Milford Highway. We stopped at a couple lookouts and also a short walk at Mirror Lakes. Passed over the Divide, one of the three east-west passes in the Southern Alps.

Most interesting was the the Homer Tunnel, a 1.2km single lane tunnel. The weather is quite often different on either side. It’s also part of a 17km stretch prone to avalanches. They close the highway and trigger the snow a few times per winter.

I’m glad we had a driver as we pulled into the ferry terminal. There’s all kinds of signage for parking of various sorts. Our approach was easy - our driver dropped us off at the front door.

We got our boarding passes and lined up at dock 4 to board. There’s lots of sand flies here, the worst area we’ve seen so far. Heather had picked up some bug repellent at Pancake Rocks which is really effective against sand flies.

We rushed on board our catamaran after they opened the gates, following the drivers advice to sit on the port side. The boats stick to the left side as go down and up the sound (similar to driving on the left) so the views are better on port. There was only about 30 or so of us on board, so there was lots of room for everyone.

We ended up spending almost all of two hour boat ride out on the lower deck, sheltered from rain by the upper deck.

It was really cloudy and occasionally rainy the whole excursion, so we didn’t get to see the tops of the peaks, but it was still very impressive to see. It took about an hour to get to the Tasman Sea, where it got very choppy and we quickly turned around. Depending on the weather it’s possible to go further out to sea and see how the sound remained unknown to Europeans for so long.

We also stopped for seals, dolphins and some waterfalls. On the way back the captain eased near a waterfall. Heather and I stayed inside for this, but other folks remained on deck. The spray was like being in a car wash, it was so powerful. (A couple days later we were chatting with folks who went the day after us, and cause it hadn’t rained that day, the waterfall was just a whisper).

We got back to the ferry and boarded our bus for the journey back home. We stopped for a couple little walks, including Lake Gunn (with 500-year old beech trees) and Lake Mistletoe.

We were dropped off back at our bnb around 5pm. The excursion makes for a long day but it’s well worth the trip, one of the highlights of New Zealand.

We showered and went for dinner at The Fat Duck. It was really good. We booked there for Sunday night as the place we originally had booked is now closed Sundays.

Te Anau, New Zealand

It was a slower start this morning, perhaps having had too much fun yesterday evening. We walked over to the bakery attached to Oliver’s (where we had dinner yesterday) to get some baked goods. We also bought some sandwiches for lunch, and granola, in case the gluten-free granola we bought earlier was also taste-free.

We ate on the little bistro table outside our little bnb. Between the yogurt and granola and fruit and pastry, we ate pretty good. Heather made herself a French press coffee, I had a tea. Unfortunately so far in NZ, tea has meant teabags and no teapot, which isn’t my cup of tea.

We were packed up and on the road exactly at 10am. Once again we really enjoyed the ease of packing up with the extra space in a car.

We retraced our route to Cromwell, connecting back up with our favourite Highway 6. There was considerably more traffic as we approached Queenstown. The highway turns south before entering town, but even there had the distinct feel of suburbia. From a tourist standpoint, Queenstown is more about adventure sports like white water rafting and bungee jumping, and not really our thing. We had decided to skip here when we did our planning, even though it seemed like half the Lonely Planet was the Queenstown chapter (maybe a bit of literary license on my part).

Anyways we were glad to finally turn south and see all the traffic melt away.

We drove through a few small towns which looked like they had a bit of character. Had our packed sandwiches at a roadside rest stop near Lowther.

We stopped for a coffee in Mossburn. I had intended to stop at Bracken Hall, which rated 4.6 on Google Maps, but instead mistakenly pulled in at the cafe before it, Dome Cafe. We ordered a slice of apricot cake based on the reviews for Bracken Hall. Fortunately for us, Done Cafe also knows their apricot cakes.

It was only 45 minutes to Te Anau from Mossburn. The drive changed back to farmland and some tall hedges again (similar to outside Christchurch).

We arrived at High Leys Lodge around 3pm. It’s a small bnb with just three rooms. Our room faced Lake Te Anau with the Southern Alps rising in the background. Yet another place with an amazing view (great job by our travel agent).

We’re here for four nights so spread our our stuff. The room had my new favourite thing in a hotel room, two luggage racks. It’s one of the longer stays we have in NZ, there’s three excursions we wanted to do (Milford Sound, Doubtful Sound and the Glowworm Caves).

We had dinner in town at Redcliff Cafe. We had made reservations for all four nights in Te Anau based on recommendations from our host, Sarah. Redcliff is her favourite.

Dinner was pretty good, with fancy meals. Heather had the salmon with gnocchi; I tried the ribeye steak. The hit was the gnocchi. It’s also the only town where we have to drive for dinner; so instead I got a bottle of craft beer from the local Bottle-O to drink back at the bnb.

It was a mostly cloud-free evening, perfect for watching the sunset, having a beer and trying to catch up in my blog.

Clyde, New Zealand

We were getting the hang of packing up our stuff now that we’d been in NZ for a few days. Having a car gives us an expanded storage - for example our hiking shoes stay in the car, and our jackets get thrown in the trunk on top of our suitcases. Much easier than having to cram everything in the suitcase. Plus with all the random short walks along the drive, it makes it easy to switch into hiking shoes and don the appropriate jacket depending on the mood of the weather at the time.

We had another nice breakfast, although I was still full from dinner and so skipped the eggs this morning. Said our goodbyes to Pete (who totally reminded us of our friend Stéphane).

It was another scenic drive further south along Highway 6. There’s a couple viewpoints along Lake Wānaka. It got even better at The Neck, a narrow strip of land connecting the lakes. We were the only car stopped at the viewpoint of The Neck, which we found odd as it’s one of the better views!

Then we drove a bit further to Lake Hāwea which if this wasn’t the quintessential picture of NZ then I don’t know what is. We stopped at a pullover, not an official viewpoint, for pics. There was the glacial blue lake with rocky mountains rising behind. In the foreground, sheep ran around a field filled with spring flowers.

There was a viewpoint a few km down the road but it wasn’t as good. The parking lot was also temporarily overflowing, a bit dangerous as cars were backing out into a highway where the limit is 100 km/h. In busy season it would be crazy.

The highway was getting busier, likely due to proximity to Queenstown.

Our lunch destination was in the heritage precinct in Cromwell. In the 80s, the construction of the Clyde Dam flooded out some communities. They preserved some of the historic buildings from the main street and reconstructed them on higher ground in Cromwell. Some are museum-like and others now house boutique stores and galleries.

It was 22C and sunny in Cromwell, we had left the clouds behind on Lake Wānaka. We had lunch at the Grain and Seed Cafe, splitting a sandwich and salad. We finally figured out the portion sizes :) decided to have a coffee later when we arrived in Clyde.

Walked along the pedestrian area in the Heritage Precinct. There were some interesting galleries and I did find steak knives in another (bnbs tend to have very dull knives). Got back to the car and drove to Clyde.

Found our way to our bnb in Clyde, took all our stuff in and then headed out for a tour of Clyde. It was just about 3pm, and most places close down around 4pm.

Checked out a couple art galleries just around the corner from us. They had some cool stuff, but nothing that jumped out at us. Then we tried to get a coffee. The first couple places we tried were just closing up. It didn’t look good for us, until we came across The Post Office, a cafe in an old post office. Had a coffee and a couple chocolate treats.

While there I googled the winery just up the street from our bnb and saw that they did tastings on request. So gave them a call, and asked if we could come by around 4:30pm. Sure enough they could schedule one for us!

So finished our coffees, went back to the bnb to freshen up, and then a two minute walk to the winery. At first we weren’t sure if we were there, until one of the owners, Chris (I had spoken with her on the phone) waved to us from the 2nd floor balcony. She was just doing some wine stuff and was in the white overalls that wine people wear when doing wine stuff.

Her husband, John, welcomed us into the tasting room. We chatted while he sorted out the tasting. He said normally Chris did the tastings but she was doing wine stuff.

Anyways we tried their Chardonnay, Rose, and their 2016 and 2017 Pinots. Chris had finished her wine stuff and joined us. They were interested in our itinerary, and suggested fish mongers in Invercargill to get smoked salmon and blue cod for when we’re in our self-catering place in the Catlins. Their winery, Clyde Village Winery, is very small, only 2,000 vines, but still award-winking. It was fun chatting with Chris and John.

Had just enough time to shower and get to our dinner reservations at Oliver’s, about a five minute walk. (Everything is a five minute walk here).

Oliver’s is in a restored old building. It’s part of a hotel that was built from old stables. We had looked at staying there when we did our planning but it seemed overpriced. Better to stay at a cheaper bnb and then eat at the restaurant :)

Dinner was excellent. We had a drink afterwards in their bar area. The bartender was a big Raptors fan, of all teams. He said North American sports are big in NZ cause the games are at a convenient time for them to follow, around midday.

It was quite the turnaround for our time in Clyde. It wasn’t looking good at first in our desperate search for coffee, and then did a 180 with the winery tour and dinner and Oliver’s. A nice end to a full day (‘full day’ relatively speaking, from a vacation context).

Makarora, New Zealand

I woke up around 4am cause the moon hit me in the eye, not unlike a big pizza pie. Literally, the moon was shining in through a side window directly on my pillow. I tried to take some pics through the window, which looked pretty good except for the double reflection in the window of the moon :(

The mountains in the distance started to get colour from dawn; it was really beautiful so I just lay in bed awake and watched. Heather woke up at some point and did the same. So we didn’t get much sleep but it was really pretty. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The sheep and cows woke up and started bleating and mooing. Eventually the sun rose over the peaks east of us.

We had a big breakfast, yogurt and muesli, poached eggs, toast with peanut butter and honey, and French press coffee. Pretty good for self-catering if I may say so myself.

When we were chatting yesterday with our host, Pete, he had suggested that we do the 2hr Blue Pools Track. Most folks just walk in 15 minutes to the Blue Pools; Pete thought we’d enjoy the full walk; he said it was his favourite in the area.

So we were on the road by 10:15am, still a blue sky. The track was just ten minutes north on Highway 6. There was just a handful of cars in the parking lot at this early hour. We were fully geared up for sun and sand flies.

The Blue Pools were nice. (Someone we met later on suggested that some people visit from areas that don’t have blue water cause of all the sediment in the water, and so blue water is really unique for them. For us it’s not such a novelty).

We were the only people on the track beyond the pools. We followed the marked trail through forest, and then later parallel to a farm, through meadows and fields of wild flowers. It was very peaceful. Fortunately it hadn’t rained recently cause otherwise the track would be very muddy.

We turned back after an hour, for a total walk of about 2.5 hours. It was really relaxing.

We had lunch at Makarora Country Cafe. It was just a couple minute drive from Wild Earth Lodge so we went home first to freshen up.

The rest of the afternoon we relaxed at our lodge. We had a washing machine and did several loads of laundry. We had been changing locations every day for the past week and this was our first opportunity to do laundry in a while.

We had scotch steaks (aka ribeye) with grilled asparagus, red pepper, onion, eggplant and mushrooms. (I definitely need to get an instant read thermometer. I overdid the steak slightly).

We sat outside again to finish the wine and watch the sunset. It really is one of our favourite places we’ve stayed.

Makarora, New Zealand

We drove further south on Highway 6 from Franz Josef to Makarora today.

First we stocked up on groceries for the next couple days at the local Four Square. The selection was small but worked well to source a couple dinners, including lots of fruit and vegetables. Our first use of our Esky (the brand name of coolers here, it’s so popular that the brand name has become synonymous with coolers, like Kleenex) and freezer packs that we had bought at Bunnings (a Home Depot equivalent in NZ) just outside the Christchurch airport.

The drive south on Highway 6 was spectacular yet again. We followed the Tasman Sea coast for most of the day before turning inland at Haast. We stopped at a few of the well-marked viewpoints (there’s markers 5km, 2km and 400m leading up to the viewpoints). Our favourite was Dune Lake lookout, which had a two-storey lookout tower you can climb for better views of the sand dunes. Also stopped at Fantail Falls, and walked to the Jetty Lookout at Matheson Park (there was a slight breeze and so no reflection of the peaks in the distance).

We arrived at Wild Earth Lodge in Makarora around 5pm. The lodge is one of our favourite places ever that we’ve stayed at. The backyard faced out to a large sheep grazing farm, and beyond that the Wilkin River and Mount Aspiring NP.

Sorted ourselves out, and then started on dinner. The bbq was a full grilling plate, rather than grilled. I did the salmon on the bbq, and Heather took care of the asparagus and potatoes. A little browned butter with caper sauce for the salmon, it was just like at home! Except the salmon was local - we will sometimes buy King Salmon at our local fishmonger in Toronto, sourced from NZ.

Finished off the wine lounging on the deck watching the sunset. One of the best outdoor decks we’ve had that could actually be enjoyed, with no bugs and a comfortable 15C.